Most modern electronic systems include one or more integrated circuit (IC) chips bonded to a suitable substrate which, in turn, is connected to an electronic package such as a module, card, board, or gate. There are a variety of known techniques for connecting the chips to a substrate such as a circuit board. An overview of some of these techniques follows.
FIG. 1 shows one prior art technique for attaching an IC package 100 to a circuit board 105. In this particular case, the IC 110 itself is inside a plastic, dual, in-line package 100 having bent metal leads 115. (For convenience, an individual IC 110 is often referred to as a "die.") Wire leads 120 are used to connect the IC 110 to the bent leads 115 of the package 100. To mount the package 100, the leads 115 are inserted into matching holes 125 in the circuit board 105 and fixed in place by solder.
FIG. 2 shows another prior art technique of attaching an IC to a circuit board generally known as the "solder-bump" approach. In this technique, the die 110 has metal pads on which small bumps of solder 130 are deposited. The die 110 is aligned over matching metal pads 135 on the circuit board 105. When the assembly is heated to above the melting point of solder 130, the solder melts to form an electrical contact between the IC 110 and the circuit board 105. In this configuration, the die 110 is upside down from what is shown in FIG. 1. Thus, the configuration is also known as a "flip-chip."
Closely related to die connection technology is the increasing use of multi-chip module (MCM) design and packaging. In short, MCM techniques seek to combine a number of different dies on a common substrate. Benefits of MCM systems include increased operating clock speeds and reduced product footprint. Some in the semiconductor industry predict that as "real estate" (i.e., surface area) on IC devices continues to shrink, flip-chip bonding techniques will become dominant. Some of the benefits of the flip-chip bonding technique over wire bonding or tape automated bonding techniques--two other common die connection methods--are summarized in Table 1. Tape automated bonding is presently a preferred method of bonding dies to MCM-like substrates.
TABLE 1 Comparison of Typical Die Connection Characteristics Tape Automated Flip-Chip Wire Bonding Bonding Resistance (0hms) 0.002 0.030-0.035 0.020 [smaller is better] Inductance (nH) 0.200 0.65 2.10 [smaller is better] Capacitance (pF) 0.001 0.006 0.040 [smaller is better] Example Bond Size, 400 472 520 one side (mils) [smaller is better]
As shown in Table 1, the flip-chip technique requires less bonding area (for a given size die, e.g., 400 mils on a side) than do either wire or tape automated bonding methods. This advantage allows, in turn, for an increased packing density of dies on an MCM substrate. Flip-chip bonding also provides lower levels of resistance, capacitance, and inductance per contact than do the other methods. All of these features support increased operational speeds.
A significant problem in assembling MCM systems, or other multi-die circuits, is that dies purchased from silicon foundries usually cannot be assumed to be 100% "good" (i.e., functional). In a large multi-die circuit, the probability that a completed circuit will contain all good dies decreases exponentially as the number of dies increases. A significant problem for companies that assemble dies into circuits, e.g., system houses, is that of testing purchased dies to ensure that they are in fact good.
From the point of view of the system house, the problem is being able to obtain dies that are "known good" so that the system house does not have to incur the cost of testing each purchased die. On the other hand, silicon foundries make their money in running wafers and often do not want to perform costly functional testing. (A plurality of chips or dies are formed on a single wafer, during semiconductor manufacturing, which is then diced.) Many silicon foundries might be willing to perform, at most, a worst-case DC test at the wafer level.
If a system house avoids testing in manufacturing a one-hundred die MCM, for example, and any one or more of the dies are bad, the system house incurs the added costs of fault isolation and die removal and replacement--a possibly time-consuming and costly endeavor. Because of the costs of these operations, all of the forward-thinking semiconductor companies are now developing capabilities to perform bare die testing in preparation for flip-chip applications.
In semiconductor manufacturing, after a plurality of chips are formed on a wafer, each of the chips are commonly probed in sequence to initially check certain of their electrical characteristics. Following this initial probing, the wafer is diced, then packaged and subjected to a burn-in acceleration test to remove those products subject to initial failure. This acceleration test simulates long-time performance by operating a circuit at an elevated temperature (typically about 150.degree. C.) while selected signal patterns and sequences are applied to the circuit. As MCM designs become more prevalent, new ways to conduct burn-in tests become more urgent, especially because replacement of faulty chips in an MCM is difficult to automate and a reworked MCM is typically not as reliable as an MCM which was not reworked. Disposal of an MCM having a single faulty chip is costly and, therefore, is not a desirable solution.
The processes of mounting individual dies to substrates or sequentially testing individual chips before they are diced are time consuming and costly alternatives. A considerable amount of time can be saved by testing an entire wafer at once. Accordingly, such all-encompassing tests are desirable.
These tests usually incorporate a test probe. One type of conventional test probe has a plurality of fixed needles mounted on respective cantilevered tungsten wires supported on an epoxy substrate. The wires are connected to an external tester and the needles are brought into contact with respective ones of the chip input/output (I/O) pads. Thus, the needles serve as contact electrodes. This needle and cantilevered wire arrangement, although used for many years in the semiconductor industry, is not suitable for high-density products. It has also been found that, when the chip under test is heated during burn-in testing, thermal expansion differences between the needles, the cantilevered wires, and the chip prompt the needles to shift from their original position. This thermal shifting is especially exaggerated when the chips are being tested in wafer (i.e., un-diced) form and can cause false readings or inputs. Thus, this probe technology is ill-adapted for reliable burn-in testing before dicing.
One attempt to meet the new requirements of testing MCM technology was disclosed by U.S. Pat. No. 5,625,298 issued to Hirano et al. (discussing T. Tada et al., "A Fine Pitch Probe Technology," 1990 International Test Conference, pages 900-06). In this attempt, probe contact electrodes were formed on the surface of a glass board by a lithographic technique. Each contact was electrically connected to an external tester via a respective conductive via passing through a hole on the board. The metal contact electrodes are stiff, however, and do not allow for significant--although small--variations in the co-planarity of the wafer contacts. Consequently, the metal contact electrodes cannot compensate for small variations in the thickness of wafer metallizations or substrate pads, or perturbations in the surface of a wafer or substrate, not to mention solder bumps. Moreover, the process to manufacture was found to be complicated and costly.
One prior attempt to resolve this compensation problem is disclosed By E. Klink et al. in "High-Performance Test System," IBM Technical Disclosure Bulletin, Vol. 33, No. 1A, pages 124-25 (June 1990). The article teaches applying lead-tin C4 (Controlled Collapse Chip Connection) solder bumps to the wafer pads and forming conductive copper dendrites on corresponding pads formed on a silicon carrier. The two silicon parts have substantially flat surfaces. Consequently, all chip positions can be contacted in parallel and, compared with standard needle contacts, only a minimum of compressive force is required.
Commonly assigned U.S. Pat. No. 5,420,520, issued to Anschel et al., teaches a method of testing chips using a conductive dendrite contact. FIG. 3 (which corresponds to FIG. 4 of the patent) shows a cross-sectional schematic representation of a burn-in board 140 having dendritic contacts 138 aligned with C4 bumps 142 formed on a chip 110. A problem with this method is that the conductive dendrite contacts 138 leave indentations in the C4s after their removal, and the C4 bumps 142 have to be reflowed following the testing procedure. The added expense and time required to reflow the C4 bumps 142 are undesirable; the present invention renders this step unnecessary.
In an effort to reliably test integrated circuit chips and at the same time prepare them for assembly in an MCM, U.S. Pat. No. 5,440,239 issued to Zappella et al. discloses a method of forming a Transferable Solder Bump (TSB) on a test substrate. As shown in FIG. 4, which corresponds to FIG. 3 of the patent, die 110 has an aluminum pad 150 through which electrical connections can be made. The test board or substrate 160 includes an electrical-contact pad, such as an aluminum pad 170, and a TSB stack 180. The TSB stack 180 is made up of a number of metallization layers: a vapor-deposited protected conductor layer 182 comprised of chromium; a solder bump 184 comprised of tin, lead-tin, an indium solder alloy, or various other alloys depending on the target melting point; a diffusion layer 186 comprised of copper or a nickel-copper alloy; and a top layer 188 of gold that eventually forms a permanent contact with the aluminum pad 150 of the die 110.
The test device 190 is bonded to the die 110 through thermal compression or thermalsonic techniques. As the name implies, thermal compression bonding uses compression and heat to form a bond between the gold layer 188 and the aluminum pad 150 of the die 110. Thermalsonic bonding techniques use compression, heat, and ultrasonic energy to introduce a scrubbing action between the gold layer 188 and the aluminum pad 150 of the die 110. Once bonded, the test device 190 is plugged into a test jig for testing. If the die 110 proves to be reliable, the die 110 is removed from the substrate 160, with gold layer 188, diffusion layer 186, and solder bump 184 intact, by elevating the air temperature and allowing the chromium layer 182 to oxidize. Thus, the tested die 110 is provided with solder bumps 184 and is ready for incorporation into an MCM or other package.
A problem with this method is that the pads, solder bumps, and associated metallic layers do not provide a sufficient margin of error along the Z-axis for testing an entire wafer. Furthermore, the method requires many steps, including the costly step of vapor deposition of the chromium layer 182. In addition, "bad" dies 110 are discarded along with the testing module and substrate, which entails a-further expense in lost materials.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,611,884, issued to Bearinger et al., discloses an Electrically Conductive Adhesive (ECA) material containing silicone resin, siloxane gum, and a conductive particulate material. The composite exhibits properties of electrical conductivity and a tacky surface. FIGS. 3A-3C of this patent show a method of attaching and detaching a chip having C4 bumps formed on its contacts to and from a substrate using the ECA material. The conductive particulate material of the ECA material may be spherical gold particles; spherical, hollow glass microspheres coated with silver, gold, nickel, or copper; or spherical particles of metal alloys such as tin-copper, lead-tin, and gold-tin.
The conductive particulate materials disclosed by Bearinger et al. have several disadvantages, including the spherical shape of the conductive particulates, the relatively high cost of some of the materials (e.g., gold), and the relatively strong adhesion provided by some of the materials (e.g., lead-tin solder). Alternative shapes such as flakes, rather than spheres, might be advantageous in certain applications. Cost savings are always desired. Weaker adhesion would allow cleaner separation between the ECA material and the substrate and, at least in some applications, would be preferred. It would also be advantageous to increase the surface area of contact between is the ECA material and the substrate to which it is attached (e.g., by using dendrites) and to increase the conductivity of the ECA material.
The known art has failed to provide a mechanism for rapid, reproducible, low cost, high throughput testing of integrated circuit chips. To overcome the shortcomings of the conventional mechanisms, a new method and device are provided. An object of the present invention is to provide a method and device for testing a chip or wafer having a two-dimensional array of electrical contacts by providing temporary attachment to a substrate having corresponding contacts without unduly increasing the number of steps required to prepare the chip for attaching it to its final assembly. It is further an object of the present invention to provide a method and device for reliably testing and/or burning-in an array of chips in a wafer by providing a reliable, simultaneous electrical connection between each electrical contact on the wafer and a corresponding electrical contact on a test substrate. Still another object of the present invention is to provide a method and device that allow easy chip positioning and temporary attachment and easy removal of chips after testing. A related object is to fill the need for an efficient testing mechanism which can easily and readily feed an MCM-like manufacturing process.